Let It Rain
by TangledUpLies
Summary: She will come back to him.


Hi! A quick thank you to the readers who read, reviewed and favorited _Shadows_! That was lovely to see despite its… nothingness, lol. But it was truly appreciated. And before I start my little (maybe not) rambling intro, I just want to say 'HI!' again to all the readers who are reading this and are still somewhat interested in my writing! I've honestly missed everyone and simply sharing all I can create of these two characters. But real life has been so difficult. Writing has been very painful. Time has been too short. For months and even at the moment, my confidence in my writing and storytelling ability are simply lacking and I guess that is likely given the time that has passed. I have been working hard and had worked on this particular piece since January, so yes; it has embarrassingly taken a while. Perhaps this is extremely overdue since everyone has left the focus of what happened after _Lauren _and are instead now I'm sure focused on what will happen with Emily since Paget is officially leaving the show after the season ends. How much then people will care, I'm not very certain. But I still needed to write this even after so long and this might have just been that small starter to perhaps get me writing regularly again. My fingers and toes are crossed. Anyway though, I had had a direction for where I had wanted to take this story. Scenes of what would happen had been in my head shortly after I had posted _Messy Little Raindrop. _ Yet with the turning of my imagination and thoughts into words had been such a struggle; this didn't turn out how I had wanted. I feel like I could have came up with something more (yes, I can be _so_ ambitious and an overachiever, lol), but I had felt unbelievably drained with what I had already done; I just left this as it was. So this isn't as much as I originally planned or as big as I had thought it would be. The beginning of this is actually what most, if not all, would be I guess… expecting. It seems very different and out of left field given how the story ends. For some reason that part had just came to me and it had taken _so_ much time and hard work, almost a month and a half to write what I had included, leaving it out didn't really sit well with me. It sounds rather awful trying to force a scene into a story, but I honestly couldn't let it go. A part of me had even thought and hoped (still is hoping) when I had wrote it that it added something to Emily that _I_ had somewhat assumed of her given what we've seen from the show. Does that make any sense? I hope I did alright with trying to tie up everything together ultimately. A note as well that what I had wrote previously in before didn't play out like I thought it would have been on the show (i.e., Emily actually having contact with Declan; that was a ~surprise I wasn't particularly fond of), so it might have changed the story a bit I'm not really sure because I didn't get any chance to rewatch the episodes for details while writing and also that as much as I would've liked to make this as plausible as possible, I guess it more than definitely far from it. Like in _Messy Little Raindrops, _the characters might have come out ~sappy and ~emotional once again. Part of the story also might have come out to be a bit too ~romantic and I am currently still debating if it's a good or bad thing, lol. Punctuation and grammar mistakes that have been left, it is my fault for not catching them all. As well as the locations and directions, I had done some research but I couldn't find the specifics I needed. So I apologize for messing up on anything. I sincerely hope I didn't offend anyone. Also just like so many times; it switches between past and present thus tenses will change. Transitions had been very difficult, but I really and sincerely tried to make it all flow nicely. I wish everyone will find some kind of enjoyment, even a little, in this. If y'all have a moment to spare, comments and whatevs are welcomed. Thanks a bunch!

And before I forget, if anyone has the time, it'll be lovely to read this while listening to "I Love You" by Taeyeon. I already feel the side eyes directed towards me given the title, lol. And when y'all download it, I think everyone will be laughing because I'm sure that most of my readers will not understand it. However, I think the song and its melody is just _absolutely_ beautiful. It's pure perfection even if there is the language barrier. I had it playing on repeat while I finished the end of the story. Three hundred plays in about a week and a half, lol. There was just something about the combination of the two that I completely fell in love with. I just thought it would be nice to share with anyone who will take the time to read the story. So I guess this is the end. Happy reading, happy listening and peace my lovelies! =]

* * *

The stars are aligned.

A perfect line side by side they stand in the midnight sky.

When it is fourteen minutes after one in the early morning on the last Friday of April as the warm spring air and the smell of rain coming fills his lungs, the crumb of lights drawn above him he doesn't expect. It's a sight he's never witnessed before. It's a sight that should make the corner of his mouth twitch. It's a sight he should deem beautiful. It's a sight he should be enjoying.

Yet it doesn't. It can't. And it's not.

Because while the little dots of hydrogen and helium glimmers away, Aaron Hotchner feels his world growing a little more dark with every breath taken. His life is spinning out of control. He can't stop it. He can't fix it. Regardless of how hard he tries, no matter what he does, and despite what he reminds himself, every minute that has ticked away since that early Monday morning when those messy little raindrops had fallen from the sky, has been out of his grasp. The nights he had spent studying pictures trying to find new clues, the hours of sleep he had lost poring over files to decipher the next possible move hadn't work for the simplest reason he finds himself driving down the near empty highway.

The small green numbers of the digital clock changes.

Tick, tick, tick; the clocks in the world turn their handles without delay.

Fifteen minutes after one in the morning it is now. Forty eight minutes since this journey has begun. He's tired. Sleep that he always had too little of, he has had none in two days.

He's nervous. Thump, thump, thump, he feels his heart ready to burst from his chest. He feels the slightest dampness on his forehead and on his hands that grip the steering wheel. In spite of the small crack of the window, the breeze blowing on his short black hair and dancing on his exposed skin, it's hot, almost stifling in the car. The black suit he wears and the perfectly knotted duke blue tie around his neck he has had on since half past seven in the morning doesn't help either.

Above it all though, the rest he desperately needs, the discomfort he feels, Hotch is grateful.

Those eight letters together he believes is too little to define how he feels. Yet it's the only word he can think of, come up with because for two months since that early Monday morning she has been left waiting, he has been left hoping that the soon he had promised her would not be merely words.

His head had spun. His heart had ached. His wish had been held by the ends of a thread.

He couldn't fail her once more.

And two days ago, it had stopped.

When it had been ten to eleven in Minnesota and he had walked into his hotel room, switched on the lamp beside his bed and made his way to the files that had hidden underneath his neatly packed suits and rolled up ties, the faint sound in his pocket had rang into his ears. Quickly he had reached in, pulling the small device out. The name had flashed brightly. Hardly five seconds had passed before his trembling thumb had slid across the face of the screen. To his ear he had placed his phone.

"Hello."

The simple greeting had masked the anticipation and the fear that had flooded in his blood.

"She'll be ready in two days…"

Her even voice, her quiet words, she hadn't bothered giving any greeting, couldn't have waited to tell him the news that he had been hoping for. He had asked if it would have been possible. With a sigh, she had responded back without promises that she'd try. She would have to make a call or two. She would have to rearrange a few details. But she'd try her best because when he had asked for her help eleven days ago, that last update that had indicated that it was time, she had whispered that she would've liked it too.

And once those six words had flowed out her mouth, Hotch had known.

His promise he would be keeping. The soon it would be happening.

"_Thank you…"_

He would be seeing her again.

They would be seeing her again because as the wheels of the black vehicle continues to roll down the tar roads, the stars above continue to stand side by side, besides him is Jennifer Jareau sitting in the passenger seat.

She had asked him fifty minutes prior. Once he had met her in the hushed bureau parking lot away from the cameras and all the way in the back corner twenty two minutes after they had returned from their case, after he for another time had left before everyone else had, she had asked him if he was okay to drive. She hadn't been able to avoid them. Even with the dimness of the lot, even if his head had been slightly lowered, those circles underneath his eyes had been too dark, too evident. But she had simply watched him bob his head twice before whispering that it would be fine. He would be fine. The drive wouldn't be long. They would get there in no time, he told her. So with her gaze fixed intently on the man she had found herself still admiring for his work, for his strength, for his dedication, the set of keys clinking together she had dropped into his coarse open palm.

Since then silent she had remained. Merely staring out to the outside world, with an elbow resting against the window as the small breeze flowing into the car moves her blond tresses, not a single word from her has been said to cut the hush between them. He hadn't doubted, still doesn't doubt that she is lost for words because a part of him continues to be too. He doesn't know what to say about this situation. He doesn't know what to say to her beside those two words, two small words that he had whispered brokenly two nights ago and two months before.

No one had taken notice of him. To ask who he was and why he had been standing there in front of the door like a statue, no one had come his way.

Alone he had been left. Alone he had felt.

In the hallways outside the wooden barrier that had separated them, Hotch had stood frozen for a while. He hadn't been able to raise his head up. Guilt of not protecting her, regret of not being able to stay with her, it had been impossible, seemed improbable to with the weigh on his shoulders. His hand had unrelentingly grip onto the door handle. The need to turn it had been greater with each second. Tears had steadfastly increased in his eyes. His thin lips had been forced firmly together. To suppress the screams he wanted to let out because through the raindrops that continued to fall from the sky, the distant beeps from monitors in the neighboring rooms just pass the heavy wood door he had still heard them and felt her.

Her cries as her battered, broken body had lain in the hospital bed trembling.

Faint they perhaps would have been to anyone in the world. Yet to him, into his ears the sound had bled through the wood and stained his heart. And that lingering feel of her body as every secret of hers had been revealed, the fears that he could ever hate her and regret them had been unbearable.

He hadn't wanted to leave her.

Not like that. Not ever.

But he couldn't stay.

A shallow, sharp and uneven breath of the hospital scent he had drawn in then before finally releasing the grip of the door handle. He had felt his insides shaking uncontrollably and violently as he blinked rapidly, hoping the salty beads of teardrops would have dried out.

They had failed to do so though.

Because just like those raindrops he had heard splash onto the glass windows and concrete grounds outside, he had listened and stared as one teardrop and more had fallen and splattered onto the edge of his polished right black shoe. His hand had risen. He had rubbed his eyes. He had wiped the marks off his cheeks. The longer he remained in place, the harder it would be to leave he had been certain. So with every ounce of strength he could have mustered up, Hotch watched as he had lifted the heel of his left foot just centimeters off the white and moss linoleum tiles and moved it back an inch.

One.

That had to be the start of it. It had been a small step.

But it had felt like a mile already.

Soon after he had raised his right foot and shifted it three inches back.

Two.

Another and another he took and ultimately away from her door he had turned from. What he had done when he had first stepped off the elevators into the nearly empty hallways in search of her he did once more. Each footstep taken, he had counted. He hadn't been able to stop himself from doing so.

Yet it had been different that time around.

It had felt longer than before. The hallways had become narrower, seemingly filling with more nurses and machines and equipment. He hadn't need numbers and arrows guiding him back to the elevators. He had remembered which corners to turn at. But most of all, what had made it different had ultimately been her. The knowledge of what room she was in crying and alone, the image of her current state burning into the depths of his brain, and the act of walking away from her when all he had wanted was to stay with her, to hold her, to comfort her and to tell her that everything with her, everything with them would be okay, the journey had been excruciating.

Hotch had felt parts of him disappearing.

Once he had reached the elevators after ninety seven steps, shaky fingers locating the circle button with the downwards arrow to be pressed for the metal doors to open sixteen seconds following, in the quiet space he stood. Little by little he had imagined the steel walls around him caving in. And when the elevator had moved, he had finally raised his head just a touch. Hazy eyes set on silver metal, the slow descending movement had him feeling like sinking into a black hole.

_She was going to be okay._

He had silently told himself that as the doors revealed the familiar surrounding. His gaze had never shifted left or right. Eyes straight ahead while dragging his feet across the floor, he hadn't look if it had still been the same nurse at the front desk that had led him to her or if it had been the same people that had been waiting in those uncomfortable chairs when he had first walked in. Instead, all his concentration has been simply to the hospital exit. He had needed to leave. Once he had stepped into the outside world, that shallow, sharp and uneven breath he had taken before letting go of door handle, to help him take the first step away from her had been released. His nostrils had been slightly flaring. He hadn't even realized he had held onto it. A salty bead of water had trickled out from the corner of his eye. The gust of March winds of the early Monday morning he still hadn't bothered him despite the one less layer that he had been wearing. The messy little raindrops that continue to decorate the buildings, wet every nook and cranny of the city soaked into his dress shirt and clung to his short black hair.

His world had been spiraling out of control.

And when he had at last reached his car through the descending teardrops and raindrops, in the driver's seat Hotch had sat motionless. The keys he held onto had been digging into his palm. His eyelids had gradually dropped shut. He had leaned his head back as his body had gone limp in the seat.

Every part of him had ached.

He had needed a breather.

Just for a moment because there were been things that had to be done. Things that couldn't wait any longer because every minute he knew had mattered to it. He perhaps had lost the time coming here, risking almost everything to see her, making sure she had known that everything would be okay. So he had run his rough hand across his face feeling the thick air filling his lungs and wiped the tears that blotted down his cheeks. The keys he held had been stuck into the ignition. And once he had put his foot on the gas, pulling out of the designated space, turned the car towards the parking lot exit, a glimpse of the building behind him from the rear view mirror he had taken.

Farther and farther the distance between them had grown.

Streets and avenues he had been on earlier he drove through once more. But the near emptiness of before had been no more. It had been the start of a new day. Umbrellas coming into his view, cars keeping him company on the road, Hotch had watched through moving windshields as the world continued to spin round.

Closer and closer he had felt himself buried into the dark abyss.

He had reached the hotel seventeen minutes until seven, parking in the car in the underground garage once more. And with the journey to his room, he had walked passed each one of their rooms, wondering in the back of his minds if they were crying still and knowing fully that they all wished they could change the last few hours and days. But knocking on their doors he had not done. Checking on them he could not do. Not even to the woman who had called him earlier, he hadn't been able to. He had things to do. So straight to his room he went into. Yet before he had closed the door, he had hung the three word sign on his door handle without hesitation.

The privacy he had needed.

Because for the next hour and eight minutes then, he had sat by the large window in his room overlooking the waking city of Boston as he made the procession of necessary phone calls. One after another, the strong and stern voice of his had never been more apparent in each of them. Explaining the circumstances, asking for the assistance, calling in his favors, he wouldn't take no for an answer.

But it had been perhaps the last phone call he had to make. The last phone call that had him asking for the number of because she hadn't been in the country. The last phone call he knew he wouldn't have ever wanted to receive. The last phone call he knew he never would have imagined delivering. The last phone call where he had heard had his strong and stern voice trembling and cracking bit by bit. Sucking in a large gulp of air and elbows on his knees, Hotch had dialed the long distance number. A fifth ring and an exasperated sigh from him had passed before the composed and familiar voice of a woman had greeted him.

"Hello."

He had swallowed the small lump that formed in his throat. It had been her. Yet he still had to ask, to make certain of.

"Hello. Is this Ambassador Prentiss?"

His hand had risen, pinching the bridge of his nose. He had been doing his utter best to maintain his strong tone.

"This is she."

There had been no hesitation in her response.

"Yes… this is Agent Aaron Hotchner..."

He had heard the slightest waver in his own name. He had already begun to falter then.

"Oh…"

The hint of surprised he had caught. He had imagined perfectly done eyebrows rising just centimeters. He had been one person she hadn't anticipated. This had been perhaps one phone call he was sure of that she hadn't for a second expected. But as soon as the trace of shock the woman had let escape, it had quickly vanished.

"How may I help you, Agent Hotchner?"

There had been nothing short of professionalism in her voice. Words that he had told her once upon a time ago suddenly had come back to him. Yes, she had been an impressive woman. And to that very second, Hotch had continued to believe so.

From his end though, there had been a pause. For a hundred seconds he had lost his words. Regardless if they had never made that bet on that last Thursday of the month of March, regardless if this had been about anyone else from his team, regardless if she had been a victim in the slithers of daily crimes of the world, he had known it would be difficult.

No parent should have to endure the news he had to deliver.

"Agent Hotchner?"

His name in question had brought him back to reality. He had quickly cleared his throat. He had run his finger through his hair.

"Yes… yes, I'm here." His heart had beaten wildly. He hadn't been able to stop the sudden dip of his voice. "I'm calling in… in regards to your daughter… Emily Prentiss..."

At the soft whisper of her name, the sudden sound of uneven breathing couldn't be mistaken from the other end.

Long raven tresses that cascaded down delicate shoulders. Large dark eyes that spoke more than words could say. Smooth ivory skin that resembled porcelain dolls in Paris window shops. As well as the pointed nose, the svelte figures and red lips, a first glance of everything on the outside, they had been alike.

Emily Prentiss had been her mother's daughter from head to toe and everything in between.

Yet far from the truth it was because if Elizabeth Prentiss had been honest to herself, if anyone would have had a conversation with her daughter, if people had realized the inner thoughts of her complicated mind and listened to experiences from the various countries she lived in and the colorful people she met, what they had simply shared for as far back as she remembered were merely the physical attributes.

They had been far from the same.

She had a daughter who hated the spotlight. She had much rather been the observer than the entertainer. She had a daughter who hated the façades. She had wanted nothing more than the truth. She had a daughter who hated the politics. She had frowned upon the dealings made with unfair governments. But above it all, she had a daughter who hated the help she had always been willing to give. She had a daughter who hated the road that had been already paved out for her. She had wanted to rely on herself. She had preferred to work, gotten her hands dirty, even if it was a little. She had looked at every direction to find the closest exit.

Her daughter had done anything, almost everything just so she could simply make her own life.

That third Sunday of the month of August, on the bright sunny morning, thirty three minutes after Emily Prentiss had finally done so on her way to Yale, Elizabeth Prentiss had walked into the bedroom her daughter had called hers for the last year.

Nothing had changed, but everything hadn't been the same.

Her bed had been made as usual. Something she had started since the age of seven even with help in the houses they lived in. She had done it without questions, without words. Her hazel eyes had lingered on the dark cherry oak headboard to the neatly made bed. The white pillows under the vanilla colored covers fluffed, matching colored sheets pulled tight to the corners with the thick comforters folded down, she hadn't been able to find a single indication that someone had slept in the bed.

Those half a dozen framed photos had scattered about her room she hadn't taken. Two of her with grandfather; one as he had held her hours after she was born while the other at the age of four and sitting on his lap in the vacation home up in Rome. One of them had been her with her grandmother from Christmas years prior. Two with her father; one of them together on a beach in Nice at the age of seven while the other had been in front of the Eiffel Tower when she had been twelve. And the last photo, the only photo that she had been in had been the family portrait. A family portrait they had posed just three years ago in an Italian studio. She hadn't wanted to do it. But it had to be of the entire family. So smiles had been asked for by the photographer, red and black of their best dress to match one another, hair combed, curled and fixed to its perfection, it had been a photo they had sent out for Christmas that year.

She had looked happy in it.

The collection of porcelain dolls, all thirteen of them, had still been on the cream colored shelf. From the very first one with the dark coffee ringlets in the lavender satin dress with the matching bow and carnation pink lips and onyx eyes that had been given from her grandmother after a London vacation at the age of three to the very last one with the wavy crimson hair in the Egyptian blue gown with the emerald colored eyes from Paris she had received from her as a tenth birthday present because her daughter had quietly informed her upon seeing the gift that she had been too old to be playing with dolls anymore, they had all been there. She had walked two and four steps closer to them. Ready to admire the figurines, their beauty, what she had discovered instead had been the thinnest coat of dust had covered them. Regardless of the years past, she had taken care of them. But her eyes couldn't be deceived. They hadn't been touch, hadn't been moved.

She had abandoned them.

In favor of the rock music that would vibrate through the walls late at night. The nose ring she had gotten without permission. The black lipstick that she had painted on her lips. The midnight hair color she had dyed herself. The dark clothing she had insisted on wearing every morning for school the last year. The sometimes dismissive attitude when asked once in a while if her day in school had gone well. Her daughter had been nothing of what she had imagined she would be become.

And when Elizabeth Prentiss had continued to wander around the room, remembering some of the knick knacks her daughter had picked up here and there, gazing into the drawers that still had her clothes and fingering the few worn out binds of novels in English and French that had been left behind, she hadn't been able to stop the water in her eyes from forming.

The realizations she might have missed too much of her daughter growing up because there had always been work. The thoughts of what her daughter would be in the future because she hadn't wanted to follow in her footsteps. The fear of her daughter living states away because she was still young. Yet what had had her heart sinking, had a lone tear quietly sliding down her powdered cheek had been the wondering if maybe her daughter had resented her, resented the life that had been provided for her because that last hug she had gotten before she had climbed into the car with as much of her belongings packed into the back had felt too short and too distance. She had whispered to her to drive safely because her daughter had begged, been so adamant of going alone. Lightly she had smoothed out the back of her hair that had returned to the natural chocolate brown since the beginning of summer and that had gone well with the lemon chiffon shirt she had worn. But before she could have said anything more, her only child had responded with a sigh and assured her she would drive safe, that she would call once she got there. Not a minute long had the hug last. No goodbye kiss on the cheek she had given or had received.

And if she could have admitted it then, if she could have admitted it ever, it had hurt.

"Is she… is she okay?"

Firm and steady Elizabeth Prentiss had tried to keep her tone. But the trembling couldn't be stopped. The uneven breathing had continued on. And Hotch had known he had to tell her. If not him, if not now, the news would travel. People would talk once everyone in the world woken and the news would reach her ultimately.

"I'm… I'm sorry, Ambassador Prentiss… but-"

"No… no…"

Her fear had cut him off. A sudden quiet cry had filtered through the phone and into his ear. It had been a sound he knew he couldn't forget. She had given her life, brought her into the world and despite the differences between them, the difficulties in their relationship, she loved her.

And her daughter had loved her too.

In Fargo they had been in to solve the case of the six murdered mothers. On the fifth night in the cool city they had finally caught the man who had done it. But as soon as the handcuffs had been around his wrists, tiny raindrops had begun to fall from the sky. It wouldn't be stopping until morning they were told. So in the city they had agreed to stay in for one more night. And when all the loose ends had been tied up at the station and they had dinner at the local diner before driving back to the hotel, to their rooms they had retired to. To pack, to shower and to sleep, it had been the same routine for all of them.

However for him, for her, for them it had been a different one for the past six months. Emily packed and showered in her room, but in his room, in his bed, in his arms had been were she slept.

Twelve minutes after midnight it had been when she had quietly knocked. With a quick glance through the peephole, he had silently opened the door. Bright yellow fluorescent light had crept into his dimly lit room. She had slipped in and into his opened arms. The door shut behind her, she had closed her eyes and buried her nose into the soft cotton white undershirt he had on. That familiar something spicy and piney scent of his combined with the flowery scent from the soap the hotel had provided had flooded her senses. His hand on the small of her back, he had rubbed the lightest circles through the black tank she had on.

She had just wanted to feel better. She had needed to think of something else, even if for a moment.

"You okay?"

That gentle inquiry had brought her to back to reality. But stopping the spreading guilt that evaded her heart it had not done.

"Yeah… I'm okay…"

She had mumbled her response into his shirt before pulling herself slightly off of him and turned up to look at him. A weary and diminutive curve of her lips had been present while she had spoken once more.

"You think we can just… sit together… for a while?"

Hotch had stared down at her. His eyes had a hint of curiosity mixed with the touches of concern, she saw. For a minute Emily had waited, wondering if he would have questioned her a bit more. He had said nothing more though, only pressing a kiss on her forehead before nodding just the slightest.

So for the next nineteen minutes they had done what she had so merely requested. They had sat by his window. On his lap she had made herself comfortable once he had settled into one seat couch. Her long legs had been bent with her knees grazing his strong chest as her feet planted on his firm thighs. His left arm had gone around her back and encircled her tiny waist while his right hand had been set on her exposed knee. She had nestled her head into the crook of his neck. The heavy navy curtains had been pulled to side to lay in front of them the cityscape drowning in the rain and the few stars that had peeked through the cloudy black sky. But despite the view they had had, his attention hadn't been to it. Instead he had been wondering about her tucked in his embrace. Silent she had continued to be. Frozen she had been still. Since her wish to just sit for a little while together, she had said nothing more to him. And when he had begun to brush his thumb across her soft flesh, the gentle, the calming movements had had no effect on her.

She had been like a statue.

Something had been wrong.

He had thought about it for a second then, his mouth the tiniest ajar pondering if he should have asked if she was alright once more because they never had pushed each other. Not to talk about the problems pounding into their brains, not to talk about feelings weighing heavily on their hearts because with them, there had been trust.

They had simply trusted each other.

Long before they had begun six months prior, he had trusted her to tell him anything she needed to, everything she wanted to and it had been the same the other way around. Her secrets he would guard. His fears she would keep safe. Even if he had been her boss, even if she had been his subordinate, underneath the complicated layers of their jobs, of themselves, they were friends.

There had been the friendship that she cherished. There had been the friendship that he had needed. There had been the friendship that had ultimately built up to _them_.

Because once they had officially begun, once they had realized that what they had been wanting from each other, of one another had been too much to be denied anymore, there had been the trust to wait for one another to come forward. Minutes, hours or days it could have been. Yet the outcome had usually been the same. Whatever that had been bottled up in his heart or stacked up high in her head, time it would only take for everything to be revealed.

Hotch trusted her.

His mouth slowly had gradually closed within moments. He always would, he had realized. The already firm hold of her body close to him had intensified a touch more. He would wait. So with a pucker of his thin lips, he had pushed them to the top of her head. That had been perhaps the trigger because just a minute following Emily had spoken.

"I talked to my mother…"

Her words had cut through the stillness of the room. Exhausted she had sounded.

"Is everything okay?"

Almost instantly he had asked. The relationship between them they had never discussed. There never had been a reason to. She hardly ever had mentioned her. His question had been met by the familiar silence of the last twenty three minutes. Another sixty seconds it had taken until she had slowly removed her head from the crook of his neck to answer him.

Emily had looked at him then. "Yeah… everything's okay…we were supposed to have dinner… tonight… since it was her birthday…" She had briefly shrugged as her voice had dipped a touch. "And I didn't show up to dinner…again…"

Because for another year; she hadn't gone.

That birthday dinner that would always be in the French bistro that was her mother's favorite. That birthday dinner her father had always made the reservations one week in advance. And that birthday dinner she would find herself enjoying more than she honestly would expect because for one night there would be no disagreements on politics, no criticisms on some of the things she had chosen in her life, but just a few stories and laughs about the past.

"We had a case," he had reasoned softly because it was the fact.

Again there had been another shrug as he had held onto her gaze. "I know…" Emily had smiled slightly. "I know… she just didn't seem… surprised… that I didn't show up… that I didn't even call earlier…"

She had long accepted that her relationship with her mother never would be the best.

They didn't see each other often. She had work while her mother wouldn't have even been in the country. They didn't share secrets. Ever since she could remember, confiding in her mother never had been her first choice. Sometimes it had been her father if he hadn't been too busy. Other times it would have been whenever her grandfather had visited or whenever her mother had allowed her to go see him on long weekends up in the French Mountains before he died. But never her mother even if she hadn't been too busy, even when she would ask once in a while if things were good. They didn't call each other too much. Whenever phone calls were exchanged here and there, inquires and conversations had usually been the same. Issues of current postings they discussed. Updates on the cities her mother would be vacationing in that they used to live in. In the end then, it would have been the same. Questions for another time if she had been happy with her job of hunting down the worst monsters in the world and if the job had been really everything she had wanted to do until one would be tired of asking while the other had been tired of answering. And then goodbyes would be soon whispered as well as the hope to hear from one another soon.

That had been the extent of their relationship.

And if Emily had been honest to herself, honest to perhaps anyone who asked her candidly, their relationship would be one thing that would never change. Their relationship would forever be a roller coaster. Going through the whirls and twirls of tension and awkwardness because seeing and understanding the same thing had always been too difficult and doing one another's best to make light conversations at times felt impossible.

Despite it though, it had never stopped her from wondering, wishing even at times, how they could've been if things had turned out differently. The possibilities if her mother had never strived to be part of the politics that had given them too many thorns in their relationship. The possibilities if she had took that first step in confiding in her that being someone else every feel months and revealing everything that she had done was wrong had her drowning in fear and shame. The possibilities if her life hadn't already been painted for her before she had realized it because Emily had hated it. Learning to live the life of a socialite, spending her time greeting people she hadn't cared for, finding the highlights of her day gossiping about the latest rumors of the people she knew, and simply unfazed by anything horrid in the world, she hadn't been able to fathom her life lived out in a bubble.

She had wanted nothing of that.

So on that third Sunday of the month of August, Emily had left. She had been more excited then that morning her parents had dropped her off at the airport two months prior for that solo trip to Paris. Everything she could grasp onto had been shoved into cardboard boxes and packed into the car that had been the graduation present from her grandfather. When it had been eight minutes past nine standing in front of the large and gated brick estate; her arms had been around her father's neck. A man who sometimes spoke more with his hugs and presence than his words whenever she didn't feel the best, he had whispered that she would do great in the world, that she was a Prentiss after all and that he had been proud of his favorite little girl. She had laughed, holding back the tears as she had told him she loved him.

Yet once it came to say goodbye to her mother, it had been different.

It had been brief. A hug they shared, a hug that hadn't occurred between them in a while because she hadn't remembered when the previous time had been and a hug she hadn't been sure if her mother had wanted to give her because for the past week it had been arguments. She hadn't wanted her to drive, to go alone. It was too dangerous her. She was still a child; a child who had needed much more growing up to do to be driving by herself through too many states. Those had been her reasons. But she had finally relented with the help of her father. Rolling her eyes and simply tired of the arguing, she had given her consent two days earlier. She had let go of her mother less than a minute later. Excitedly she had climbed into the driver's seat. The keys had soon been in the ignition. And slowly she had pulled out of the garage. The black iron open gates she had passed seconds after and that had been it.

It had been the first steps, her first steps.

She hadn't looked back. She had been free.

Hotch had watched her bite the corner of her bottom lips. "I don't know… I guess I was just… thinking about… with the case… and her birthday…" She had shrugged for another time in the night. "I was just thinking about it…" About how the people that they had helped in the last few days would be growing up without mothers, about the people they had helped in the last few years had been growing old without mothers. Yet she had hers still. Her mother that she rarely saw, her mother that she could barely talk to, the guilt had crept into her mind and sank into her heart.

"If… maybe… that we could've been… different…" she had quietly confessed in the dimly lit space.

That small desire, the forever wondering if her and her mother could ever have something a touch more stable and a lot more understanding, she had admitted, aloud, for the first time in her life. And it had been to him. To this man who had been holding her for the last twenty six minutes. To this man who had weaved into her head and heart in the past six months. To this man had been unraveling her with his stares, his touches, his kisses, his words and his mere presence in her life.

She had let him in, showed _that_ part of her. That part of her she tried to not let bother her. That part she had done her best to hide. That part of her who was a little embarrassed and a lot ridiculous because even after so long, that a good relationship with her mother was one thing she still wished she had.

"That's all…" The tiny crack in her last word had hardly been audible.

A minute smile had flashed before him seconds afterwards. Evidence to prove she was okay because she hadn't wanted him to think of her as weak. Hope that he would simply forget she had mentioned anything in the first place because she hadn't wanted any pity. And a mask put on to conceal the sudden blur rising in her gaze towards him because compartmentalizing had begun failing her then.

But Hotch had heard it. Simple and piercing her admittance had ringed into his ears.

Six years they had been partners on the field. He had never seen anyone compartmentalize like she had done. Deep cuts and purple bruises he had seen on her face from the job. Still she had walked with her head held up high. Six months ago they had begun discovering one another. The contagious curves of her pink lips had always tugged the corners of his mouth. She had a laugh that would echo in his mind for hours.

Yet this side he had yet to see of.

This side, this state of vulnerability, of need she kept locked, hidden and guarded because soon enough her gaze had dropped. Emily had licked the corners of her mouth. Her throat had gone a touch dry. As his eyes had continued to be fixed on her, watching as she had begun to pick those short and bitten nails like so many times since he has been with her, he hadn't known what to say.

Nothing that could have made her felt better.

The words to say that would erase the disappointment she had thought of herself and ease the guilt she felt in her had been lost to him, him who hadn't had the best relationship with his own parents, especially his father. So he had done the only thing he knew of then. Hotch had brought her closer. She had stopped moving her fingers. He had pressed his lips to her hair once again. She had suppressed the faintest whimpers.

Simply holding her he had done then.

Even after she slowly twisted her head to softly pucker her mouth to his neck, even after she had whispered those two words of gratitude, even after he had brought them into his unmade bed and they had crawled under the heavy warm comforters and long after she had fell into slumber with the slight dampness to her thick curled lashes and he had subsequently followed her, his arms had continued to encircle her tiny waist.

The one comfort he provided had been the one comfort she needed.

And once dark skies had changed into hues of pinks and orange and his eyelids had gradually lifted up to merely discover her asleep still, calm as her soft and even breaths had filtered his ears and simply beautiful with the morning light glowing on her skin, in his arm, his embrace he strengthened a bit more; Hotch had been certain.

He never wanted to let her go.

That one night had him learning one of the most guarded parts of her. That one morning had made him realize that he just might have fallen for her. That one event had been embedded in him that could be played like a movie reel because for nine minutes it had.

Elizabeth Prentiss had demanded in a quavering voice and suppressed cries to know what had happened, how it had happened. He had no choice but to grant her wish. For her to simply discover the undercover mission taken, to learn of the name that would be burned into her mind and to discover what the past weeks, last days and final hours her daughter had endured through, he had told her what she had wanted to hear. He had been forced to relive all he couldn't fix. She had been given images of her daughter she wouldn't be able to forget. And when he had finished telling her all she shouldn't have to hear, whispering once more that he had been sorry for what she had lost, who she wouldn't be able to see again, the faintest cry had escaped as her voice had broke.

"Um… thank you... Agent Hotcher… um…"

The call he hadn't wanted to make, informing her that she had to bury her only child, Hotch hadn't known and he hadn't questioned her broken gratitude because the dial tone had soon filtered into his ear.

Silent the room had become. Void his heart had become.

Alone once more he had been.

The raindrops seeped into the threads of his dress shirt had dried.

Staring at the phone that had been placed before his sight on the small cedar wood table, the list in his head had been checked and double checked. He hadn't left anything out. Everything he could think of that needed to be done had been achieved. He hadn't left anyone out. Everyone he had needed to talk to had been contacted. The strings had been pulled. The promises had been made.

It had been finished. It had been official.

Safe she would be. Protected she would be. And away from him she would be.

For one minute then, for the five minutes after and for the thirteen minutes following, Hotch hadn't been able to move. His head he hadn't turned to see if it had stopped raining because the sounds of water against his window had quieted down. His arms and hands he hadn't been lift from the table because the weight on his shoulders had grown heavier. His burning eyes he hadn't been able to close because he had believed sleep wouldn't be easily for him for a while.

He had had his second chance.

A second chance that he hadn't thought he deserved all that much because that first time at love had blown up in his face. The life of finding the monsters of the world he had needed and the life of the white picket fence Haley had wanted hadn't been able to survive. They hadn't been able to find the balance. He had worked too much. She had felt his priorities had changed.

She had felt him change.

The job he had worked so hard for, the job he had been so good at had been so much more than she had liked to admit. He had become the job. It had become his identity. He hadn't been able to deny it. And she hadn't been able to cope with it. She hadn't been able to handle. The life they had planned together, the life they had hoped for had been no more. Alone and by himself he had been left with. Calculating all he had done wrong, circling every other weekend on his calendar that he could see his son, finding himself giving whatever parts left of him to the job he didn't believe he could let go, he shouldn't have had it.

Yet he had.

He had her.

To his unsuspecting mind, she had surprised him.

His head she had gotten into. He hadn't been able to close his eyes without seeing her face. He hadn't been able to sleep without hearing her voice. Keeping him up into the nights since that first time in Colorado when he had been scared of losing her, diving into his deepest thoughts when he had survived nine stab wounds, Emily had weaved into the part of him that stored every bad memory, that housed every monster, that kept him focus on the job. That part of him that might have made her turned away from him. She had known about his greatest demons. She had understood his biggest fears. But she hadn't run. Her continue trust in his judgments, her unrelenting trust in him, by his side he had constantly found her. And when all bets had been placed between them, she had still wanted him. It had been him she chose when it could have been anyone in the world.

To his locked heart, she had found a key.

Because when Hotch had stared at her beside him the morning after in Atlantic City as the yellow rays of natural light filled his room and she had been sleeping still with a hand tucked beneath the fluffy white pillow as a few strays of her raven colored tresses fell across her rosy cheek, he hadn't regretted it, he hadn't regretted her.

It had been beautiful. She had been beautiful.

What they had done with each other, what they had revealed to one another, it had been exhilarating. He had been free from wondering, from the imagining. Everything about her, everything with her had been better than he could've hoped for, imagined of. And the days that followed and the nights that came, she had made him feel again. The warmth that would start in the pits of his stomach and the butterflies like a school boy she put there. With her quiet words, her infectious laughs, her broad smiles, her soft touches, her seductive kisses and her mere presence by his side, his world that had moved so fast, that had grown so dark had been slowed and had glowed.

Emily had been his second chance.

He hadn't been able to fathom the possibilities. Losing his second chance; losing her when he shouldn't have had it in the first place. He couldn't let it go. He wouldn't let go of her. Even if it had meant until the very last second of the five years, what he had promised her, he would keep.

She would be home again.

And five years they would have.

As the thoughts had raced through his head and his chest had tightened a little too much, Hotch hadn't heard the soft knock on his door. Once, then twice, a third and finally the fourth rap he had realized the sound. His head had carefully turned. There had been another knock. Almost painfully he had pushed himself up from the seat. His legs had hurt. His body had ached. His steps had been heavy across the carpet. Cautiously he had looked through the small hole. A heavy sigh had released quickly after. He had rubbed his hand over his face. The lock had slowly been turned. He had gripped the round doorknob and gently turned it.

At the other side of the heavy piece of wood had been JJ.

Her arms had been crossed against her chest. She had wanted to stop trembling. Her long blond hair had been tied back and up into a ponytail. It had felt too hot and too suffocating in her room. Her gaze had been slightly lowered. She hadn't known how to look at him.

Because even after the hours that had drifted by, hours since they had made the quiet deal between them as tears had begun to pool in her eyes, the onslaught of those salty beads of water had continued.

She hadn't known how to stop.

Yet he had still seen it.

Hotch hadn't been able to avoid it even if he tried. The redness, the swollenness of her blue eyes, the luminous lights of the hallway had made it too apparent.

JJ was strong.

For the years he has known her, worked with her, that had been one trait he never doubted. One of the strongest people he has ever met he is certain of. She had the quiet strength that most people underestimated and overlooked. Whatever that affected her, she would do her best to brush off until later, until she would have been in private because like everyone else on his team, showing weakness, revealing that the job, the victims got to them, got to her, it hadn't been allowed to happen.

It hadn't been an option.

So words about her current appearance, questions concerning her state he had not mentioned and he had not asked. It wouldn't have been necessary. All he had done was the small step to the side as he had pulled the door a footstep back for her entrance because he had known why she had came.

To swear upon the secret they would be carrying. To lay out the plans that had been set up. Everything had needed to be exact. Everything had needed to be perfect.

That had been why she had called earlier looking for him.

They had needed to finalize their plan.

And once JJ had softly trudged inside his room, the subtle sound of the door closing she had heard behind her, Hotch had watched as she had scanned the dimly lit room.

His phone had sat alone on the small cedar wood table. She had wondered if he had just finished what he needed to do because she had. She had called the people she knew. The news of her death had been immediately released to the media. The bed had been hardly slept in. There had been no imprint of a head on the large pillows. The heavy comforters had been barely ruffled. He hadn't been sleeping, if at all, she wouldn't have been all that surprised. She hadn't missed the pile of files by his go bag. Each manila folder filled with names, faces and information he would, she would, they would never forget she had been sure of because for the last three days every word, every sentence had been stitched into her brain.

He had been the one to call her.

She had been tired. She had been ready to go home. To hug her son who had been waiting up for her, to kiss the man who had given up his career to be with her, she had been collecting the last few documents that had needed to be checked over for tomorrow. But thirty four minutes after seven her phone had quietly buzzed. She had without a glance reached for the small device. And when JJ had given her greeting, the exhaustion slightly evident in her name, the voice at the other end of the line had been thick

"JJ, it's Hotch."

Not since the week after she had officially left nearly six months ago, going back to collect the last of her items remaining in the small cramp office that was hers for the last seven years had she talked to him. He had smiled faintly at her, she had remembered. He had asked her if the first week of the job had gone well. He had assured her that she would be great. And he had told her once more. No one had been in line; would be in line to replace her. He still had the hopes of getting her back.

That had been the last time they had spoken.

Her brows had furrow. Surprise and confusion had taken over her immediately then.

"Hotch? Is-"

"We need your help."

He had been abrupt. He had been urgent. He had been anxious. Yet it had been the panic in his tone that had set her off.

"Something's happened to Emily…"

Those four words she had not foreseen.

Before she had been able to inhale the air that had suddenly gone heavy around her, information he had begun to pour out. She had felt her world turn dizzy. A man that had been on the world's most wanted list, a secret that had been kept hidden, a mission that had been set out to be completed, a part of her had wanted to believe that the last twenty one minutes had been a synopsis for a movie.

But it hadn't been.

They had desperately needed her for help.

She had been the one with the specialized knowledge in terrorism. She had been the one with the resources to delve into her past. So JJ had called home. She had apologized to her son that she wouldn't be home to kiss him goodnight. She had whispered to the man who had had dinner waiting for her what she had learned moments prior. Then for the following hours, she had begun on her own mission. She had called people on her list. Disrupting most that had gone home to be with their families and disrupting a few who had already been asleep, she had learned of all she could what had happened eight years ago.

Her mind had spun round and round.

And once it had been twenty six minutes after one in the morning and her suitcase had been filled with files and information and the visitors pass had been clipped onto her black coat, her black heels had clicked against the same brown polished floors towards the familiar double glass doors.

It had been a twisted way back home.

To deliver information she had gathered, information that only would only lead to more questions, more wondering, a part of her hadn't known how to. Yet JJ had to. She had told them all what she had discovered. Of the team she had been part of, of the man that had became their enemy too, and of the life she had to built with him because what she had said solemnly, Hotch hadn't expected to hear.

She had infiltrated into Ian Doyle's life. She had been the secret weapon he couldn't refuse. She had been one person he simply hadn't been able to resist.

The information, the help he had needed, they had needed from her had made his world quietly stop. It had been then when the images had first flashed into his head. Her wrapped in his arms in the mornings and nights, him touching every inch of her skin that he had been savoring for nearly a year, them reaching their peaks together as his name would slip from her swollen lips, Hotch had wanted to shut his brain off. He had wanted to punch something, _anything_. Yet glaring at the screen that had been covered by the images of her face, having the sudden chill crawl up his spine and feeling his heart drop a thousand stories from the sky had been all he could do.

He had had to contain his emotions. He had had to remind himself.

Even to the very moment as he had continued to watch JJ looking around his dimly lit room, he had to still. Locking up his emotions; reminding himself for the simplest reason that what they had begun on that last Thursday in March in Atlantic City and what they had become since then as she had laid in the hospital bed seven miles away and he had left with her tears staining his heart had still been their little secret.

No one had been let into their club.

"Would you like… to sit?"

His hoarse words had sliced through the silence and her thoughts for a moment. JJ had briefly turned her blurred eyes toward him, only to find his hand gesturing towards one of the seats at the table. Without a word she had sat; her arms still in the same position. Hotch had taken back the seat he had previously occupied. Across from one another they had remained frozen. She hadn't wanted him to stare at the tears that still rose up in her eyes. So her gaze had been downcast. Yet his gape he had on her. He hadn't known what to say except for one thing. What that had been on the back on his tongue since she had found him behind those double doors that had became another barrier to get to her, what he hadn't been able to say because talking had hurt too much.

It still had been.

His throat had been unbelievably dry. Despite the three times he had swallowed, hoping to moisten his vocal chords, it had still felt rough. Yet she had to hear it, even if he knew those words would never be enough.

"_Thank you…"_

He had been more than thankful. He had felt indebted.

For agreeing to help him, for keeping her secret, for the guilt that was weighing on her shoulders for putting their family through this, it was a whisper his gratitude had came out. The roughness of his voice had remained even at the low volume. But it had been loud. It had been clear. In the room, into her ears, those two words had been like crystals between coals.

And two minutes it had taken until she finally looked up. Her mouth slightly open wanting to tell him that he hadn't need to thank her for anything because she had wanted to do it, because that had been her friend, she had been her family, JJ had found him staring out into the grey and gloomy city. His shoulders had been slumped. His lips had been terse. His jaw had been set. Those circles under his eyes had been dark. The water in his gaze had been evident.

He had looked distant. He had looked broken.

One other time he had looked like that. One other time she would never forget. She had remembered then. So she had slowly closed her mouth. Her gaze had fallen.

She had said nothing. He had said nothing. They simply had said nothing.

For the hour that they had sat together frozen as the quietness had surrounded them once again, neither had been able to muster any words.

There hadn't been anything appropriate to say.

Just like now.

As they pass the quaint counties, as he follows the arrows that tell him that he should stay on the right lane, feeling his shoulders slump a little every now and then, it resembles, it feels like that Monday morning when they had made that pact.

It's thick. It's heavy.

There isn't anything appropriate to say.

So they simply don't.

And for thirty four minutes as the last nine miles that separate them disappear with the dots above a little less bright with the minutes gone, the silence between them persists until that white structure faintly comes into their view. The flag that stands so tall and strong in front of the building Hotch can see waving back and forth from the spring breeze.

Immediately his breath halts in his throat. His back is straight. His shoulders are even. JJ sits up beside him. Her tiny gasp she tries to suppress.

They are here.

This building that they have been driving to for the last eighty two minutes; she has been hidden away and protected here.

He wonders how she has truly been.

Seeing the building growing taller and grandeur before his gaze with each roll of the tires, those brief little updates he has kept in his mind and cherished mean almost nothing to him now. She had been transferred. She had been coping. She had started her treatments. She had taken her first step in weeks. She had just been doing extremely well. Those were the words he had been told by the woman beside him. Yet despite the news on how she had pulled through physically, what he had desperately needed to know had been, has been still if she was pulling through mentally, emotionally because Hotch knows her like the back of his hand. Emotions she has not shown, tears she has not shed, her head she has kept high in front of the strangers, the doctors and the nurses he is most certain of.

The grip he has on the steering wheels stiffens as the tightness in his chest rises.

Nothing will, nothing can compare once he sets his sights on her after these last eight weeks.

Three minutes then it takes then for them to exit the highway. Two turns to the right and a turn to the left, the strong iron gates they stop before. With a flash of their badges, their credentials and the notice that they were expected to the security guard in the booth, the iron gates gradually open. Towards the main entrance he drives. He hears the loud; the heavy thumps of his heart once he enters the parking lot. A space beneath the bright white light he finds instantly. Then slowly parking the car in between the yellow lines painted on the ground, the cracked windows are closed. His shaking hand reaches for the keys. The ignition is turned off. The keys jangle when they're pulled out. Then for a long moment as the sound of the engine dies down and the sound of crickets suddenly fills their ears as the jagged edges of the item he holds in his grasp dig a touch into his callous palm, they are both motionless in their seats.

Staring at the white structure together, his eyes burn with the passing seconds as the blur rises in hers.

She is there.

Somewhere in one of those rooms, by one of the windows that are lit up, she is waiting for them, waiting for him to fulfill that promise he had made her sixty days ago.

And with a slow inhale of the air in the vehicle, for the first time since they had begun their journey to bring them here, to bring them to her, Hotch opens his mouth just the slightest.

"Are you ready?"

That simple inquiry is murmured between them. In his rough voice, his tired tone, what he questions shatters the tension.

"Are you?"

There is no hesitation as JJ questions back. And before he realizes it, he feels it. Her blue eyes are turned from their destination and they're sinking into him. His shoulders that had tensed up, that had been even moments ago upon seeing this building fall once more. Waiting for a response, gauging the emotions he is trying best to hide and keep in control and locked into black boxes in his head, in his heart because he doesn't answer her. For a minute, for three, he remains silent because towards him it is loaded. The question merely requires a one word answer. Yet he doesn't know in all honesty what to say. Whether to say the one word answer with three letters stringed together or to say the word with two letters glued side by side, sitting there at that moment, gaping at this place that she had been calling home, calling her safe haven for two months, Hotch is left speechless.

Yes, he is ready.

He is ready to see her. He is ready to make sure with his own eyes that she is okay. He is ready to hold her in his arms. He is ready to kiss her for the first time in eight weeks. He is ready to feel their bodies pressed together. He is ready to tell her, to promise her all over again what he had first whispered on their first Christmas together. He is ready, more than ready to guarantee her that when they have finished their five years _together_; they will have fifty years and a lifetime _together_ if she wishes.

But no, he isn't ready.

He isn't ready to hear her cries. He isn't ready to feel her body trembling from pain, from fear. He isn't ready to feel their hearts grinding into a pile of dust. He isn't ready to tell her that he still hasn't caught her monster. He isn't ready to hold her in his arms for just minutes before she will be ripped from him. He isn't ready to be left wondering where she will be in the world. He isn't ready to let her go yet.

The answer that should be so easy, so straightforward is nothing of it. His gaze drops. He is defeated. His head is lowered. He is a failure.

"I don't know."

So that is what Hotch tells her.

That is his answer he cannot, will not deny. He pushes his thin lips together. It is the naked truth that makes JJ barely nod her head as a soft sniffle comes from her before she reaches for the door handle. She is out of the car in seconds while he sits in his seat for a bit longer.

Like that early Monday morning, he knows it. He needs to be brave for her. He needs to be strong for her. He will have to be. Yet he doesn't know if it will last, that façade that he will be unbreakable. He is not even certain if he can last. It had been knocked down when she had pleaded to not hate her. He had completely faltered. He had shown her his tears. He had let her realize his fears.

Ten thousand stories from the sky he had fallen. Ten thousand and one pieces he had been broken in front of her.

But he can't this time.

He simply _can't_.

His head rises. A slow deep breath Hotch draws. He exhales loudly. Keys still in one hand, he blindingly finds the door handle and tugs on it. And his first step onto the tar ground beneath has him unbalanced and his surroundings whirling as he clenches to the door with one hand while the other just touches the bridge of his nose. Nine seconds before he feel everything settle in his head and around him, he release the grip of the door and shuts it quietly and calmly. He presses the small red button on the car control. The locking click sounds piercingly in the parking lot. The keys in his hand are pushed into his pants pocket. He takes one step forward and another, maneuvering between the cars while JJ does the same on the opposite side.

Soon enough, they are both walking side by side toward the main entrance. Steps slow, steps steady, it reminds him of that early Monday morning again. He can't move any faster. The wind blows on his open suit jacket. He doesn't believe he has the energy to. So slow and steady it is to the double automatic doors. And once they open when they stop in front of them; that smell, unmistakable and distinguished smell of the hospital attacks him without abandon.

Four weeks with Foyet, six weeks it had taken after that Monday morning to scrub this smell off his skin.

His eyes hurt under the vivid white bulbs with a few inches into the building. Hotch can't help but squint for a moment while he follows JJ towards the front desk. He stands besides her. His gaze dances around the American flag that stands behind the seated nurse, the photos of recovering soldiers and politicians that hang on the wall and the mere emptiness of the room.

"Yes, how may I help you?"

He catches a glimpse of the clock above the elevator.

Three minutes after two in the morning it is now.

They had been told to be here at two. It could be no earlier they were informed. That had been the precise time they had been given to say what they needed to. Yet for how long they would even have, he is uncertain.

His shoulders he feels fall a little more.

"I'm Jennifer Jareau from the Department of Defense and this is Agent Aaron Hotchner of the FBI and we're looking for a Sarah James," JJ says steadily.

The name pierces his heart.

She has kept that name, that identity that had been given her to protect her that night in Boston. And when the sun will rise from the horizons, it will not be the only name she will have to be assuming soon. She will be this person. She will be that person. She will be of names made up. But to him, she will always be one person. She will always be the same person. The same person he had met once over two decades ago on a sunny morning in Washington D.C. The same person he had given a chance to without promises six years ago that night after St. Louis. The same person he had betted his heart on thirteen months ago under the black Atlantic City sky.

He can never think of her, see of her as anyone else.

Gradually Hotch turns his attention back to nurse. She's bringing her thick rimmed frames down her nose to study the badge and credentials JJ holds in her hands. It takes him hardly any hesitation for him to pull out from inside his suit jacket the same items for inspection. Moment then she shifts her green eyes to what he has. Briefly she bobs her head. A minute then another, they are both given visitor tags. He clips it to his suit jacket. She clips it to her thin coat.

"Room 472… there is security by her door and you will need to show your identification prior to entering," she informs them with a weary twitch of her plump red lips.

Without delay, they both utter those two words of gratitude simultaneously before turning their heels against the white tiles beneath them towards the elevator. He presses the upright arrows once they stand by the metal doors. The sharp ding is heard instantly. He lets JJ enter first before taking the two steps into the cabin. A small glance he takes of her pushing the round circle with the number four when they are enclosed in the small space. The soft humming of the metal cabin ascending quickly filters into his ears. He lowers his head, staring at his polished shoes.

Closer and closer he is getting to her. He feels his heart racing under the suit. His palms are moist. He finds it difficult to think straight.

He doesn't know what he will say first. He doesn't know what he can do first.

Hug her until he feels her molding into him, kiss her until their lungs beg for oxygen or promise her five years and a lifetime until she will be ripped from him, what is possible to do he is uncertain of for the simplest reason that he has forgotten one thing.

There will be an audience

He will not be alone. They will not be alone. The woman beside him, the woman who has helped him, helped her will be in the room. She will see what they have been hiding from everyone. She will be a witness to their hearts shattering.

His hand grazes the outside front pocket of his suit jacket.

The large lump in his throat forms immediately.

With another sharp ding, the elevator doors open. His head shoots up. Hotch hadn't even felt them stop. Just like when they had entered, he allows JJ to take the first steps out. Then side by side they stand for a moment. A handful of nurses, a few machines and empty beds occupy the halls. Looking around the signs that hang above their head and the powder blue plaques engraved with black numbers and letters, they turn to the right. Down the halls they walk together with the beeps of monitors filling silence between them. With a turn to the left, following the numbers that increase, it takes another turn to the left before they see two men at the end of the hall. Their movements halt. They're dressed in suits like him. JJ turns her head up at him. He gives her a fleeting look before nodding and their steps continue once again. And in his head he counts until the thirty ninth steps because then it is when they officially stop.

He wastes no time in reaching into his pocket to tug out his credentials. "Agent Aaron Hotchner and this is Jennifer Jareau from the Department of Defense," he says as evenly as possible. Next to him, JJ does the same. With a close look at their pictures, at their faces, the man with the salt and pepper hair that stands to the right in front of him holds out his hand.

"Agent Samuels and this is Agent Walters," he says tersely as he motions to the man next to him.

In moments hands are shaken. Quiet greetings are murmured.

"Will you both be traveling with her?" Hotch doesn't hesitate in asking.

A small motion of his head Agent Samuels give. "Yes, we will be. We have been overseeing Agent Prentiss' security since she had been transferred here."

He stares at the closed door behind them. He sees nothing. He sees no one through the tiny window.

JJ clears her throat. "How is she? How has she been doing?"

The man smiles faintly and in his eyes, he looks surprised. "She has been doing exceptionally well. She recovered rather quicker than the doctors had been told she would. She went through some trouble and difficulties in the beginning when she began moving again… but she's quite a fighter."

That she is, that he knows, Hotch wants to say.

But he doesn't. Instead he asks the question that he is afraid to. "And when she will be leaving?" His question is low. His chest rises and fall a little too rapidly under his suit.

"_Soon." _

That one word is stressed. It hurts to hear. It punches him in the stomach. As if this man already has a clue how those four letters placed side by side has been affecting him for the past eight weeks.

She will be leaving _soon_. He will be letting her go _soon_.

"May we see her?" JJ whispers softly and hopefully.

Another faint curl of his mouth the agent offers them. "She's been waiting."

Turning around then, Agent Walters gently grips onto the silver door handle. He can't stop himself from shifting his eyes to the floor. Agent Samuel moves to the side. JJ walks a footstep ahead of him. A gentle click is heard when the handle is turn. Bit by bit the door is pushed open. He watches as his feet move over the invisible line and into the room he is in

This is it.

"You have visitors."

The statement from the man he met mere moments ago is barely audible. His head spin. His heart beats wildly out of control.

This has been what he had promised her eight weeks ago. The soon has become now.

So a deep breath Hotch takes. The air around is too thick, too suffocating to take in. He feels the rapid beats of the organ between his lungs. It will break through his bones, rip through his flesh and tear through the suit he believes more than ever now. His insides are shaking without abandon. He feels his stomach in hundreds of knots. His hands clench into firm fists by his side. He slowly lifts his head. His heart that had been beating so wildly seconds prior immediately stops. It lodges into his parched throat.

And all he wants to do then is fall to his knees.

Because who he finds, who he sees is _her_.

Just the eight feet away that feel like eight miles Emily Prentiss stands.

_She is okay._

By the foot of the made bed under the intense white bright lights of the hospital room she has called her own for the past eight weeks, her head is high. Her hands are to her side. Her shoulders are squared. Her back is straight. Her feet are together.

She looks strong. She looks just like a fighter.

Yet as she continues to stare across the small room, her large onyx pupils slowly finding the one face she had needed more than ever to desperately see, with her lips forced firmly together while hearing the secondhand of the clock hanging on the wall going tick, tick, tick, the appearance she gives them, gives _him _is nothing but that of an appearance because Emily cannot do it.

_She cannot cry._

Unlike that early Monday morning; she simply cannot show him her tears. She cannot show him her fears. She cannot show him her weakness.

She will be brave for him. She will have to be strong for them. She will live up to what he believes she is.

Strong and a fighter, she doesn't want to let him down.

That had been what she whispered to herself two days ago.

The walk around the hospital floor with Fiona she had returned from. The quiet nurse who had been by her side since she had arrived, her hand she had held onto for a touch of balance as she had gingerly sat down at the edge of her bed. And once she had thanked her for her assistance, whispered that she would be taking a nap soon if her body, her head would allow her and smiled a bit that she would be alright by herself for a little while, alone she had left. Her fingers had brushed against the thin fabric of the hospital gown. In two days she wouldn't have to wear that anymore. Her gaze had roamed around the room. The powder blue walls that had felt like prison walls and home, the small pot with the pair of tall and vivid yellow daffodils Fiona had given her a week before with a sad coil of her red lips when she had been informed that she would be released soon, the bed she had been currently resting on, in two days none of it would be hers anymore. As a trembling exhale had escaped between her parted lips, her eyes had drifted to the window towards the cloudy sky that had seemed to be threatening with those messy little raindrops that she had grown less fond of since that early Monday morning; there had been a gentle rap on her door. She had turned her head to find Agent Walters. He had taken a step in. The door had been gently shut behind him.

A faint upward twist of his mouth had appeared before her. "How was the walk?"

Emily had done her best to return the gesture. "Good… it was good," she had murmured.

The man had nodded then. Soon enough her eyes had shifted. She hadn't wanted to talk. She hadn't wanted to be asked if she was feeling better since yesterday. She hadn't wanted to be bothered with anymore details of what will be happening. To the sky above, to the outside world, her attention had been towards. In two days she would be gone from here. In two days she would be someone else once again in her life. And in two days the soon would be over.

Her scarred chest had risen and fell rapidly within moments.

In forty eight hours it would be officially over and she hadn't known how to feel.

Scared she had been.

She had needed his reassurance. She had needed to see his face. She had needed to feel his arms around her. She had needed to taste his lips once more. She had needed for his something spicy and piney scent to cling onto her skin. She had needed to tell him he had been one of the best things that had ever happened to her.

But grateful she had been too.

She hadn't wanted to be selfish. She couldn't put him in anymore danger. She couldn't risk him any longer. She hadn't wanted him to see her in this state a second time. So damaged in so many places and perhaps so unfixable in so many ways, she had been ashamed of herself. She had hated herself. For what she had known she was doing to him, to all of them, she hadn't believed she could face him again. She hadn't been able to bear the thought of seeing him stay strong for her. She hadn't been able to stand the thought of hearing him promise five years into her future, into their future that grew bleaker as the days passed.

_I'm so sorry._

So Emily had had to begin to accept it.

The early Monday morning when he had already risked so much to see her, when all secrets, tears and fears had been revealed, when he had held her in the small hospital bed, when he had firmly stated that he could never hate her, when he had whispered over and over again that he loved her, when he had given her hope for what they could be, would be _together _in five years, it had been their goodbye.

That would have had to be their final moments shared. That would have had to be their final moments that would forever stain her head and her heart until the next time, if there even will be a next time, they would see each other.

And they had had to be final moments that she knew she had to cherish it.

Because in the end; they had it.

When she had thought saying goodbye to him had been everything she had carried with pride, his gift and those three little words from that third Sunday morning of October being placed in her drawer for him to find, they had had so much more.

Her bottom lip she had bitten. The view before her had gone hazy. She had wanted to scream. She had needed to cry. But Emily hadn't. Days, weeks it had been since anyone had known how she was truly feeling, since she had felt the salty beads of water slide down her cheeks.

Boxes filled with tears, fears had been stacked and piled high in her head, in her heart.

She had compartmentalized once more in her life.

Despite it though, that heavy load and weight she felt in her, hollow she had been. Void she knew she would be until her monster would be caught, until she could go back home to him, to all of them.

A throat had been cleared in the room. Agent Walters had still been there.

"There had been a request…" he had begun.

Her heart without hesitation had skipped two beats. The air in her throat had been stuck. Nervousness and alarm had pumped through her blood. And in the pits of her stomach, the back of her brain, Emily had had an inkling of it, of what else he had been about to say with just those five words.

Inside and out, like the back of her hand, she had known him.

Then six small steps Agent Walters had taken. He had continued slowly, almost carefully.

And she had been correct.

His name had been said, and she hadn't been surprised. He was determined. She could trust him for that and so much more. He would have done anything to see her. He would have asked anyone he could for help. He would have kept his promise to her. He would give her the soon that they had both needed. But then her name he had mentioned. The woman who had called the early Monday morning when he had been holding her, the woman she hadn't seen in three months, the woman she had considered her friend and her family, she would be coming too. They had requested to see her. Two people who had helped her, two people who had been the ones who started everything for her, they had wanted to see her before she would leave, he had whispered. And their request had been granted. Yet there had been one condition. If she would be up for, if she wanted it, she had had a final say to it all.

So she hadn't been able to sleep that night.

Her thin fingers had danced along the dark fabric that had been keeping her warm. She had still had it; his suit jacket that he had left her with to keep her warm that early Monday morning, she had clung onto. By her side she had kept it because that something spicy and piney scent of his had faintly lingered on even after so long it has touched his skin.

On her back Emily had laid when it had been precisely three in the morning because sometimes it had still hurt to curl on her side. Her head had been turned. Staring at the window dotted with drops of water, those messy little raindrops had begun falling after she had quietly whispered her answer. All she had been able to do was think and imagine what would be of, what it would be like in two days. She had been nervous. She had been afraid. Then onto the edges of her bed she had gripped before carefully pushing herself up. She had lightly gritted through her teeth. Her long legs she had moved. Three minutes and a few deep breaths it had taken until her bare feet had come in contact with the cold white tile floors. She had hugged the thin robe she wore to her a little. With the guide of the sleeping world outside, she had trudged across the room. She had stepped into the cramped bathroom. The door had been closed. The lock had been twisted. Her hand had felt for the light switch. And once it had been flicked up, her eyes strained to see for a brief moment to adjust to the brightness, her reflection she had ultimately gazed at.

Her ivory skin had vanished. Instead it had been pale, almost ghastly sick under the single light bulb above her head. She had licked her dry lips. The pink color of the day would disappear once the moon had come out. Her face had grown the slightest thinner. Everything that touched her tongue had been tasteless. The cuts and bruises on her cheek had gradually healed. The scars had begun to bit by bit fade away. She had brushed her hair to the side. Her bangs had been gone. Her raven colored tresses had grown longer; just about two inches pass her drooping shoulders. The dark circles had been underneath her eyes. Sleep she had hardly had enough off because she still saw _him. _Running after all of them, finding her, those nightmares had had her spending too many mornings watching the sun rise from the horizon.

Empty she had looked. Dead she had felt.

Emily had wondered then would he recognize her because if she could have told anyone then, said anything then, she hadn't recognized herself.

She had resembled nothing of what she had been like one year ago. She had felt nothing like what she had felt six months ago.

And when her hand had ascended to behind her neck, gently yanking on the end of the string that had been tied in a bow, her fingers had pulled on the white fabric sheet around her neck that covered her once it had came undone. Her palms had been moist. Her chest had heaved up and down quickly without control. One tug followed by another and then another, it had taken eight hard tugs before she had finally seen it.

So many times her touch had brushed against the black ink on his wrist. Dozens of nights she had sucked and kissed the flesh with this design. Countless days she had admired the small and intricate lines and curves.

And now she had it.

With her left breast exposed, that harsh pinkness against the fragile white, the four leave clover that would be on her forever, that would be part of her forever had stared directly at her. Her lips had trembled. The blur had risen in her eyes. She had begun to sweat. Her quaking fingers had shifted. Then for the first ever time since she had been given this reminder of the past she would never, can never forget, because she never could do it, Emily had finally touched the risen flesh. The lines she had traced. The curves she had remembered all over again. Skin to skin she had felt it it. And without hesitation, a quiet whimper had escaped from her.

Simply dirty she had felt. Simply disgusting she had been.

Her quaking hand had covered her mouth. She had heard him still. The tears had been clinging on. She had felt him still. Mocking her, handling her, admiring her still like that unforgettable night, Ian Doyle had been relentless with his laughs, his strokes and his eyes.

_She had been tainted._

What would he honestly think of her once he saw this, she had easily imagined.

He wouldn't look at her. He wouldn't want her. He would be more repulsed than she was.

She hadn't been able to hold it in any longer then. Compartmentalizing had completely failed. She had cried. Tear after tear; they had slid down her cheeks without abandon, without care. She had clutched to the sink. Her body had shaken. She had felt the sharp pain rushing to her abdomen. But it had been nothing compared to the ache in her cracking heart. How could she ever show him this, how could he ever touch her again, the questions, the fear had crossed through her mind. However an answer she had needed desperately to find, wanted dreadfully to know had been answers that could be no where found.

It hadn't been possible.

And once she had calmed, once the air of the hospital had begun filling her lungs, she had stood up straight. She had wiped the wetness from her cheeks. She had blinked once and twice. She had stared at herself once more. Her long lashes had been clumped together by tears. The dark circles beneath her hollow eyes had turned red. She had looked paler. She had been more broken. She had felt voider.

Emily had known then.

She couldn't show him this. She couldn't do this in front of him. The soon he promised her, the soon that would be happening in two days; it would be the last time he would have of her, see of her until her monster would be caught. She hadn't wanted him to remember her looking this, being this. So she had whispered herself. She would not cry. She would be brave. She would be strong. She would be a fighter.

There had been no other option.

For him, to him, she had owed that much.

She had to do it.

And as he stands there, just twenty five footsteps away that separate them, she continues to vow to herself that she will.

_She cannot cry._

He looks tired. He looks older that early Monday morning. He looks different and the same. His head is high. His lips are squeezed tight. His jaw is set. His shoulders are squared. And his eyes she helplessly connects with. They're dark. They're glassy. Just like that early Monday morning when he had crept into her room, finding her laying in the hospital, he looks simply broken.

_I'm so sorry._

She is why he looks like this. She is the reason they're all going through it. The pain, the heartache, the guilt, it's all because of her.

"Excuse me."

The silence that had encompassed them is cut by Agent Walter's gentle words as he takes the three steps out of the room. The door is closed once again. Her chest rises and falls quickly. Alone she is not anymore. Her heart is beating wildly. His head is spinning. He doesn't know what to do. She doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know if he can stay strong for her. She doesn't know if she can handle this.

And when they continue to stand motionless, speechless, their blurring eyes sinking into one another; it is the woman two steps in front of him that makes the first move.

Her gaze shifts. But his remain on her, on them.

The sounds of sniffles and heels against the white tile floor are heard as JJ walks towards her. In seconds they are in an embrace.

"How are you feeling?" JJ inquires quietly. "You look good."

Despite her back to him, Hotch knows there's a smile behind the question, behind her statement because he's certain.

She will be strong for her too.

"_I'm sorry, JJ…"_

Those words slip from her lips helplessly.

"_I'm so sorry…"_

She wants to cry so badly.

For putting the burden on her shoulders, for having her lie for her, Emily is. So she can't help but simply apologize to her. Yet within moments, the faintest chuckle is the response. JJ pulls back. She shakes her head. She takes her colds hands into hers. She squeezes her fingers. She does her best to contain those beads of water that form at the edge of her blue eyes. She tries her hardest to keep her voice level.

"You have _nothing _to apologize for." She means it with all her heart. "Do you understand me?" Her smile widens. "You do _whatever _it takes to protect your _family_."

Words she had whispered five years ago, JJ whispers once again. It is the truth she must know, must understand because she had done it for hers. When she had ran, when she had thought she could face her monster alone, she had done it to protect her family. But now, roles have been reversed. She will lie. She will keep her secret. She will take the consequences that will come with it. She will do whatever it takes, whatever it means to help keep her protected, to keep her safe because she is family.

And she regrets nothing.

Instantly their arms are around one another for another time. Emily bites the bottom of her lip. She cannot cry, she tells herself again. What has she done to have found people who would risk everything for her, she isn't sure. Yet she has and she thinks, she's certain that she doesn't know if she ever can repay them.

Sixty seconds then it takes before JJ loosens the hug. Her smile is still intact.

"_Whatever it takes, Emily."_

A short squeeze is given to her shoulders. JJ steps to the right. Emily allows her arms fall to her side. She instantly tugs at the sleeve of the thin grey sweater she wears. Two pairs of eyes are directed towards him in the same place steps from the door where he has remained standing, watching and listening because Hotch can't move.

He doesn't know if he wants to. He doesn't want her ripped from his arms once he will finally get to hold her. But he has to. He swallows the lump in his throat. He has to soon because he knows that the clock is ticking. Time is disappearing for him, for her, for them. The minutes he has left of her standing before him, to hold her, to promise her five years and fifty more _together, _is slowly disappearing.

This is their soon.

"Hotch…" JJ's voice rings into his ears.

It's his turn.

To say something, to do _anything_, he doesn't know if he can do neither because all he can still process is that she is _okay_ in front of him.

Her pink lips are parted. She looks shocked. She looks scared. She has become paler than before. Her dark hair he has missed touching, missed smelling has grown longer. Cuts that had been on her face have turned into fading scars. Bruises on her cheeks have disappeared. She seems thinner, smaller than he has last seen her.

Yet beautiful she still is.

_He can't let her go._

Beautiful she will always be to him.

_He can't lose her too._

Seconds it takes for him to find her eyes once more. Her onyx pupils are trembling. They're watery. They're blurring before him. They're burning through him.

And he knows it then because inside and out, just like the back of his hand, he knows her.

She is willing herself not to cry. She doesn't want to break in front of him. She is staying strong for him. She is being brave for him.

But as he stays frozen in place swallowing hard and her short nails continue to dig into the soft material of her sleeves while sixty seconds passes and another one hundred and eighty that follow, wondering if, hoping when it will be until the distance between them vanishes, she thinks she will just about to.

Emily feels the tightness in her chest. She feels the sobs slowly rising up from the pits of her stomach.

Time is not on their side.

It is now or never.

He has to move. Her feet are stuck to the floor. He has to make that first step to her. She doesn't think she can muster any strength to do it. But he's waiting for something. Why he is and what it is, she doesn't have an inkling of it though.

All she knows is that the feeling in her chest is becoming more unbearable by the second. The sobs are rising up faster with every struggling breath she takes.

She can't control it anymore.

"_Aaron…"_

His name out breathless and cracked between her pink lips echoes in the hush room.

The only pair of blue eyes in the room widens a touch.

She doesn't want the distance between them any longer. She needs him to hold her. She needs him to kiss her. She needs him to say something, anything to her.

Just _him_ she simply needs _now_.

That terse line of his mouth twitches the slightest as he feels a few dozen punches to his heart. He has missed it. Her saying his name, nothing can compare to it. And at the moment, it's desperate and an arrow into him.

Hotch wants to beg the world to stop turning.

Those twenty five steps that separate them are erased in eleven. She will see it all. A tear without pause lets go of her long lashes once she blinks.

In his arms she finally is.

And she cannot stop crying.

"_I'm so scared…"_

As her limbs frantically slide around him underneath his open suit jacket, gripping onto him through her remaining strength and quaking hands while her face buries into his strong heaving chest, those salty beads of water soak his dress shirt and stain his shattering heart without pause.

He will remain strong for her. He simply must.

One arm around her neck, the other surrounding her tiny waist, he holds her tight. His eyes fall shut. He presses her trembling body as close to him as possible. She feels; she is smaller that he has last held her. His own face he nestles into her hair. She wonders if he can feel her scar, if her disgust is molding into him through the layers of fabric. He inhales too deeply, too shakily hoping that there is just the slightest touch that will hang on him, that will seep into him. Yet vanilla and blossoms are no more. All he smells on her is the air of the hospital.

This will be the scent of hers sinking into the pores of his skin. This will be the scent of hers he will be left with.

"_I'm so scared, Aaron…"_

Of what will become of her, of what will become of him, of what will become of them, she doesn't know if she can survive. She doesn't know if she can lose him. She doesn't know if she can lose them.

A hard kiss against her temple he bestows with his quivering lips. The arms that hold her are loosen. Her head he quickly pulls away. His forehead he presses firmly to hers. Their noses are grazing one another. Their lips are a mere two inches apart. And her sobs continue to filter into his ears and surround the room. Those crystal water beads fall desperately. She cannot stop crying. She cannot stay strong for him. She cannot be brave right now.

All she had whispered to herself, all she would do for him, all she owed him, she simply just cannot do.

She is not a fighter.

"Do you… do you remember what I told you?"

His question wavers uncontrollably through clenched teeth. Everything he had told her that early Monday morning as those messy little raindrops that she loved fell from the black sky, she has to remember; she has to believe in.

"Emily, look at me…" He wants her to look at him. His thumbs sweep the onslaught of tears away from her cheeks. She merely shakes her head frantically. She will not be able to handle it if she does.

But she simply needs to.

"_Look at me, Emily_…"

Her trembling hands moves. She feels his heartbeats fast and hard underneath her fist. And once twenty one seconds in her head drifts by and he gives the slightest push with his nose to hers and the heels of his hand presses into her cheeks, through a haze, the sight of his gaze brimming with tears only make her own fall harder, fall faster.

He will not; cannot let them fall in front of her.

Emily moves her head side to side vehemently.

"_I can't…" _

She can't break him any more.

"_You can't, Aaron…"_

He can't save her any longer.

This just might be the end. This just might be their final goodbye.

There will be no more soon in their future.

But it is not. It will not. It cannot.

Not to him, not for him because with her he sees more possibilities than he has ever imagined, ever even thought probable.

"No… no… because you… you are going to be _okay…_" Hotch whispers softly and steadfastly. "That was what I told you. _You will be okay…" _He bobs his head gently. _"And we're… we're going to be… okay…because everything… everything is going to be okay…" _He does his best to smile.

And before she can continue, before she will allow her tears, her fear to dominate all she wants to say, all she thinks, their hope, their wishes, their love summed up in those two words that had been whispered between them that first Christmas together, he simply tells her.

"_Five years…"_

A heart wrenching sob rips through her.

He will promise her this. She will have to trust him with this. That regardless of the time that will pass, the time that they will be apart, with him worrying too much about her as she wanders through the world, in the end, he is more than certain. He will bet everything he has.

They will have those five years _together_.

"We are going to have it…"The water hangs on to the corner of his eyes. _"We are going to have five years… and… fifty years… and… and… so, so much more…" _He feels his heart ready to crush his bones and burst through his chest. _"Do you hear me?"_

She breaks free of tight grasp he has on her. Then his chest she buries her face into once more. His arms waste no moment in surrounding her shaking body. She feels, she hears the loud and hard thumps of his heart vibrating through his body. And every single tear that falls from her, he catches with no fail.

"_So much more, Emily…"_

Aloud and through her sobs and echoing into the room he tells her this without falter, without hesitation and without care because six steps from them, JJ has stayed. Frozen, her feet have been planted onto the tiles. Watching, wondering if her hazy gaze is playing a trick on her. Listening because everything that has been said between them, everything that has just been meant for the two of them she doesn't believe she can forget.

Her fingers grasp onto his sides. Hotch fees the coldness from her. "_You _are going to make it through this…" He breathes deeply. _"I promise you…"_ He needs her to nod for him. _"We are going to get through this…"_

Hope she must have.

She will come home. She will come back to him.

Whatever it takes, he will do anything for her. He will do everything for her.

In moments his head lowers. He nudges her with just the slightest push. With a hand sliding up her back and settling onto the nape of her neck has his thick fingers splay, he pulls her back once again. Then together they stand once again with their foreheads against each other, their noses grazing. But it is this time Emily bites down on her lips, doing her best to suppress the continuous oncoming sobs. It is this time that needs no prompting from him to look at her because as the tears push over the barriers and slide down from the corner of her eyes, she looks directly at him, into him.

What she finds then, in those glassy and broken eyes is hope.

The hope that he had had the early Monday morning still resides in him. He has not lost it despite everything. He truly believes that she will be okay. He sincerely thinks they will have their five years. And he honestly sees fifty years and _so_ much more for them.

In a flash of second, her toes she is on. His lips she seizes. Her cries he swallows.

Their first kiss in eight weeks is shared.

Even now she tastes every bit like strawberries. Even now he tastes every bit like coffee.

It's beautiful. It's frantic. It's heartbreaking. It's desperate. It's excruciating.

And as his tongue glides softly against hers and her tears that slip between their parted mouths, more than anything in the world she wishes that time will freeze.

By him, with him is where she wants to stay.

One hand cups her cheeks. Her lips fall from his. Their trembling pupils are connected.

"You are…" Her voice is shaking. "You are… _one of the best things_…" He has to know this. "_One of the best things_… that has _ever_ happened to me, _Aaron_…"

Words that she needed more than ever to tell him, words that are wonderful to hear, words that makes his heart soar merely squeezes his heart without mercy at the moment for the simplest reason he is more than sure why she is telling him this.

"_I love you… so, so much…"_

Without pause he's grinning sadly before her watery eyes.

"_Right back at you…"_

A beat passes. That is what she is supposed to tell him. A second goes by. That is her line for him. Another crack to their hearts take. Yet through the tears then, through the few cries breaking free regardless of how hard she continues to rein them in, her hand covers her mouth as a faint laugh from her mouth escapes unexpectedly. She truly doesn't deserve him. He brings her closer for another time. Nothing she has done, everything that she is, he is too good for her.

His touch runs down her back. He sighs heavily, shakily. "You will be okay…" His insides are shuddering. She is tucked her underneath his chin. "Shhh…" Her eyes drop shut. _"Everything will just be okay_…." he finishes firmly in her ear as the hold of her intensifies.

For a while in his arms then, they are frozen.

Doing their best to forget about the time that is left, forgetting about the third person who remains standing footsteps away still listening because she can't turn her ears off but no longer watching for the mere reason she feels like an intruder.

Emily feels safe. They are quiet. She feels protected. They are together. And she feels warm.

The mere thought makes her remember that moment. What she has of his, what she has to return. Her eyelids slowly lift up. She's so tired. From the lack of sleep, from this soon, from crying, everything feels like a daze. The sight of his duke blue tie is hazy. Yet she can still make it out. That perfect knot of his. It squeezes her heart. Slowly her head lifts from his chest. She has one more thing to do. Her eyes are downcast. She tries to take a deep breath. He stares down at her. Tears still hanging on the edges of her large dark eyes, the ones that have fallen mark her pale cheeks.

Back and forth she turns her head the slightest. "Um…" His embrace of her doesn't loosen. She sucks lightly on her bottom lip. A hand lets go of him. She sets her eyes to the left of them. A small step to the side she takes. His gaze follows hers.

The first time since he has walked into the room, he realizes it, he sees it.

She still has it.

Her trembling hand reaches for the suit jacket lying on top of the made bed. She clutches onto it as she brings it between them. So many nights this has kept her warm and kept him by her side. Her mouth parts slightly.

"Keep it…"

The murmured words make her dart her gaze up at him. She only finds him looking down at her with a frail upward twitch of his thin lips.

"In case… _in case you get cold_…"

Wherever she will be, wherever she will go, she will always be a littler warmer; she will always have a little reminder of him.

Instantly her lips quiver. A nod she slowly gives him. He pulls her back to him once more. And as his dress shirt is quietly soaked for another time, a kiss to the top of her head he gives her.

He will never let her go.

They will have five years, fifty years and _so_ much more.

He is sure of it.

"Hotch…"

That familiarly calm and quiet voice flutters into his ear. He breathes a touch harder. Ten seconds he counts in his head. His eyes he finally turns up. JJ raises her arm the slightest while her hand gestures behind because lost in their moment, lost in their own world; they hadn't heard the soft knock on the door.

"She has to go…"

The words difficult for her to say are more difficult for him to swallow.

A nod he hardly gives in responses. His attention returns back to her in his arms. She grips onto him, onto the fabric between them tighter.

"_You will be okay…" _She will remember this. "_We are going to be okay…" _She will believe him.

He takes her face in his hands. She looks directly at him, into him. His thumbs rubs against her wet cheeks. Despite his heart shattering, his tears that are begging to fall, Hotch still smiles for her.

"_Everything… everything will be okay…" _

She will trust him.

For the first time then, Emily nods for him. One hand moves up to cup his face. The coldness burns his warm cheek.

"_Soon…"_

Through the salty beads of water that touch the tips of his callous fingertips, she whispers to him one word that has meant so much, said so much to them in the last eight weeks.

"I'm going to see you _soon_…"

Without delay his lips catches hers. She sucks on his bottom lip. His tongue slips into her mouth.

She will be the end of him.

And once they pull apart seventeen seconds later with his hot breath dancing along her skin, Hotch gives her a confident confirmation.

"Yeah… you're going to see me _soon…"_

Her lips are pursed together firmly. His breathing is labored. Their eyes are closed together. His heart is a pile of dust on the floor. Another pucker of his mouth he sets to her forehead.

"_We're going to see each other soon…"_

Two more nods come from her before the grip she has of him gradually loosens until he is free. His arms he unwillingly drops. One step then three she backs away from him. She doesn't bring her eyes up and neither does he because just like it had been for her that early Monday morning when her blurring eyes had turned to the messy little raindrops outside her window, he can't do it.

Hotch can't watch her leave.

He can't watch her walk out that door only for him to be left wondering, left anticipating when their next soon will be happening.

So all he has last of her as his sights are glued to the white linoleum tiles are the soft footsteps away from him, her cracking voice telling JJ that she will be okay, that she will stay safe and the lingering stare she has on him once she reaches the door, once she reaches for the handle, once she gently turns it and take the two small steps out of the room because everything about him, everything of him, she wants to, _needs_ to remember until they will meet again.

She will come back to him.

Everything in the world moves. But everything inside of him freezes.

Because when sixty seconds pass, then three hundred and before four hundred twenty seconds tick away, in the hospital room he remains, she remains a dozen footsteps apart. His arms continue to rest on his sides. His lips are pushed together. He can't move his feet. He can't make himself leave. The squares beneath his feet turn into a haze. All he wants to still feel is her.

Standing there then, Hotch does.

He still feels her trembling against him. He still feels her fist above the pieces of his grinded up heart. He still feels the wetness of her tears.

"You went back… to see her… that morning… didn't you?"

The quiet question cuts through the hush of the room. Blue eyes are sinking into him once again.

Their secret is no more.

What they have been hiding, protecting is not just between the two of them anymore.

But he doesn't care.

For a minute then, what she wants to know hangs in the air until his eyes he slowly lifts up to her. The tears are building. His pain is evident. JJ watches him swallow hard. A frail coil of his thin lips appears before her stare. A slow nod he gives her. His hands clench once then twice, the tips of fingers brushing alongside the front pocket of his suit jacket, he whispers, confesses softly and almost inaudibly to her.

"Yeah… yeah... I did…"

Nothing more is said because he believes nothing more can be said.

Hotch gently turns his head. Seven steps he takes away from her. By the window he stands. A water droplet hits the clear glass. His eyes dart to the sky. There is no trace of it.

The line of stars has disappeared.

There is only blackness above him. There is only darkness in him.

His head hangs low. He hears a raindrop. His arm rises slightly. He hears another. His breathing grows heavy. The front pocket of his suit jacket he reaches into.

In a moment he pulls it out.

The velvet against his rough and callous flesh is smooth and soft. Four ounces becomes heavy in his large palm. And when his thumb brushes alongside the top cover, one salty bead of water finally falls from his eyes. It splashes down and soaks into the black cloth without hesitation, without control.

Five years. Fifty years. So much more.

Hotch is certain.

They will have it all.


End file.
